D-Day and the Bedford Boys

Have you ever been to the National D-Day Memorial?

This may surprise you, but the D-Day Memorial is not on the Mall in Washington DC.

Instead, it is located in the Blue Ridge Mountains in the town of Bedford, Virginia.

The D-Day Memorial was dedicated by President George W. Bush on June 6, 2001.

I had the honor of visiting there in 2002 not long after it opened.

And let me tell you. It is a breathtaking sight to be sure. I must have taken a hundred pictures that day.

So why Bedford, Virginia and not Washington, DC?

Proportionally, no single town in America lost more men during the D-Day Invasion than Bedford, Virginia.

Of the thirty Bedford Boys who landed in Normandy, nineteen perished on those beaches. Two more died later in the campaign. And another two from a different unit died as well.

That’s quite a high number for a town that only had 3,200 citizens in 1944.

So to honor the sacrifice of the Bedford Boys — and all the young men from towns across America — the National D-Day Memorial was placed in Bedford.

The memorial bears the names of all four thousand, four hundred and thirteen Allied soldiers who perished in the D-Day Invasion.

It is the most complete list of any memorial in the world.

If you ever find yourself in the Blue Ridge Mountains, it is definitely worth a day trip to Bedford to see this magnificent memorial to those who fought to liberate Europe seventy-three years ago today.

Check out this video from the National D-Day Memorial website:

 
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